Rome: four days in the eternal city

A review of some of the best restaurants in and around Rome.

I spent four glorious days in Rome, and thanks to my culinary critic friend, had four excellent meals. My friends, Maureen and Franco, took me to some of the best and one night, Maureen made a wonderful meal for us.

The first evening, we went to Il Pagliaccio which has two Michelin stars. Although everything was delicious, it was a little too creative for me. For example, I chose a gnocchi dish that was presented in such a way as to mask the real taste of the gnocchi. They were stuffed with sea urchin and were crispy rather than the soft succulent gnocchi I know and love. For my main course, I had guinea hen which came as a cylindrical construction filled with corn, tamarillo and earl grey-flavored grapefruit. Franco ordered a truly wonderful wine for our meal: Le Vigne de Zamo, Il Re Fosco 2008 and that was marvelous. My dessert was fine: two "cigarettes" filled with warm melted chocolate garnishing a poached pear with lemon thyme.

Maureen and I had a girls' night out the second night on the Gianiculum Hill at Antico Arco. I had been to this creative trattoria before, and couldn't wait to return. It was wonderful. Everything was well-prepared and recognizable. I started with spaghetti coated in a spicy cacio (cheese) sauce that was absolutely delicious. The restaurant serves small portions of what your companion orders so that you can taste everything. Maureen's Fettucine al Farro (a grain) with porcini mushrooms and grated sausage was also excellent.

For my main course, I ordered a gallinella (a firm white fish) with asparagus in a light cream sauce. It was a winner.

Throwing caution to the winds, I ordered dessert: a very rich and wonderful tortino al cioccolato with rum ice cream. This was a warm chocolate cake with a soft interior and one of my favorite sweets. I love this restaurant and will happily return.

The next night, Maureen decided to make us a simple dinner at home: trofie al pesto and a wonderful insalata alla Caprese. Two beautiful and delicious dishes. Trofie are braided short pasta from the region around Parma. The dish includes potatoes and green beans. I first learned about it from an American vegetarian cookbook! The insalata was simply gorgeous.

On my last day, we took a drive to Fiumicino (that is the town where the airport sits). It is also a village on the Mediterranean with a lovely port. The main draw for us is the wonderful Ristorante Pascucci al Porticciolo.--a spectacular seafood restaurant. We all ordered the superb tasting menu.

After the stuzzichino (amuse-bouche) of raw marinated mackerel, we had the first course: crudo di mare: a panoply of raw fish including scampi, caviar, rouget and a tartare of swordfish. This was an elegant and tasty dish.

Next came the signature calamari fritti al composta di arancia e cipolla: fried calamari to dip in an onion-orange garnish. The calamari were tender and not at all greasy and the sauce introduced a tangy and sweet flavor to the dish. Wonderful!

Next was an beautiful pasta dish: Maltagliati di grano Saraceno alla paranzella con vongole zucchine e bottarga (see photo). This is a postage stamp-shaped grain pasta with clams, zucchini and a pressed fish egg concoction that was shaved on the plate. Maureen suggested we mix in the bottarga to get the full flavor of the sea. This was an interesting and savory dish.

The main course was Arrosto di mazzancelle con finocchi al limone polvare di zenzera et liquirizia: huge roasted scampi in the shell with fennel, pulverized lemon, ginger and anise (licorice). Such an elegant and flavorful dish. There were four large scampi garnished in a very creative and pleasing way.

We all chose the Fichi rossi caramellati in forno al rosmarino, sorbetti di fichi e marsala de Batoli for our final course. This is roasted caramelized red figs with rosemary, fig sorbet and Marsala wine. Franco thought that the dish would have been better with a sweet wine and I must agree. However, it was very good even with the spicy Marsala.

After such a big meal, we took a short walk along the port and then slowly made it back to Rome.

Arpège

A truly memorable experience at a three-star restaurant which has been a temple of creative cuisine for many years.

For restaurants in France, the Guide Michelin is my bible. Every restaurant in it is one that the inspectors (who always dine in cognito) have approved. In other words, they refrain from listing a place that is not acceptable. The coveted stars ensure a restaurant's future and the Bib Gourmands are also tried and true indicators of places to seek out.

About a month before visiting Paris from Tokyo, my friend, Noriko contacts me so that we can make a plan to go to a grand restaurant--meaning one with stars and/or a great reputation. We have been to many together but today's experience was particularly memorable. It sparkled in the way I want a restaurant of this caliber to sparkle.

Alain Passard was the main chef for Alain Senderens for many years in the latter's restaurant L'Archestrate. Senderens had three stars for many many years and finally decided to move to bigger quarters. When this happened, Passard took over L'Archestrate, had it totally redesigned and opened it as Arpège. He was immediately rewarded stars, and 10-15 years ago, received his third.

Passard is an extremely creative and innovative chef and has developed a passion for vegetables. For our lunch at Arpège today, we chose the vegetable tasting that is representative of his art. Also on that menu is a choice of either fish (today's choice was poached lotte) or fowl (pigeon today). Noriko and I both chose the lotte but, in fact, when the restaurant began its parade of gâteries (treats) we were able to taste the pigeon as well.

The vegetable menu was fresh, original and delicious. During the meal, I remarked to Noriko that this really was a one-of-a-kind gastronomic experience. I never would have thought that vegetables could be so lovingly prepared and that new combinations of them could be so remarkable and so tasty.

With our aperitif came a bit of beet that had been roasted in a salt crust and served with a caviar of blackberries. The sweetness of the beet and the berries contrasted exquisitely with the salt. A simple mesclun salad came with a bit of sweet praline sauce and slivers of parmesan and that too made for a superb combination of salt, sweet and savory.

There was a wonderful green tomato gazpacho that had a scoop of celeri-rave/mustard ice cream: splendid. Light vegetable ravioli were each stuffed with something different and equally textured and wonderful. There was a gratin of red onions that was enhanced with lemon zest and black peppercorns. The onions became caramelized and so added a bit of sweetness whereas the pepper corns added savoriness and the lemon tartness.

Passard's signature vegetable dish was a medley of fresh vegetables (baby carrots, white asparagus, tiny grape tomatoes, cabbage, turnip, etc. etc.) each of which had been cooked separately and upon which was strewn semolina. The semolina added a bit of depth and consistency to what would have otherwise been a more pedestrian plate of vegetables. This dish was truly spectacular.

Passard has so much respect for vegetables and with his creative hand, transforms them so that they are definitely the stars of the show.

As time went on, we were regaled with other vegetable dishes that were not on our menu but were equally lovely. It seemed that we had gone to heaven!

For the main courses, we had both the lotte, which came in a light vin jaune cream sauce with smoked potatoes and crunchy fresh cabbage and the pigeon which was roasted in herbs and served with a smoked eggplant caviar. Although we didn't order both dishes, the staff wanted us to taste them both. And they were sublime.

We chose wisely when it came to the cheese cart as we were already quite full and had our dessert to anticipate. I had a three-year-old conté and a chèvre and tried something wonderful called the Tommette de Lorraine. The delicious bread also came with an irresistible butter that definitely held its own.

I don't know how to describe the three wonders that were our desserts. First was the tarte aux pommes "Bouquet" de roses with a caramel sauce made of salt butter. The "roses" that comprised the tart were basically apple ribbons that had been made into the shape of roses. The picture explains it better than I do. I thought that our meal was over, but then, one of the servers came out with a table to prepare our next dessert: the tomate confite aux 12 saveurs servie avec une glace mélisse.. This is a candied tomato in a very flavorful sauce served with a sublime herbal ice cream. The tomato is actually a ball of diced pieces of vegetables and tomato covered with the candied tomato skin.

Before our coffee, the server asked if we wanted to taste le millefeuille--an offer we could not refuse. This was layers of flakey pastry and in between the layers were plums and blackberries--no heavy crème patissière (the part of the millefeuille that I particularly don't like).

Noriko and I spent 3 1/2 memorable hours at our table tasting dish after dish of edible jewels. It truly was a luncheon I will never forget.

Le Bib Gourmand

A review of Le Troquet--a Basque restaurant in Paris that has the coveted Bib Gourmand in the Guide Michelin.

What exactly is Le Bib Gourmand? It is a notation much like the Michelin star that identifies a bistrot of outstanding quality where you will get a terrific meal at a reasonable price. I always look out for the little smiley Michelin man's head that is that symbol. I am rarely disappointed.

Eric took me to Le Troquet (a Bib Gourmand restaurant) in the 15th arrondissement to belatedly celebrate my birthday. Arriving on one of the first days after les grandes vacances (summer vacation), we were surprised to find a full and bustling restaurant at the early hour of 8:30. I thought to myself that many people had found the secret of this little hole in the wall and I was even more excited to check out the menu.

Le Troquet has a menu dégustation for 40 euros and a three course meal for 32 euros. Le menu dégustation consists of six small dishes representative of the chef's talents: 2 appetizers, a fish dish, a meat dish, cheese and dessert--all chosen from the à la carte menu. Everyone at the table must agree to choose this formula.

We decided to go for three courses and ordered many of the same things. First was a luscious dish of marinated salmon with red cabbage and fresh pistachios garnished with crème fraîche. Following this wonderful beginning, we each ordered a poached fish with sauce vierge--a sauce of capers and diced vegetables. Eric's dorade royale came with a purée of celeri rave (celery root) and my filet de bar was delicious without an accompaniment.

To end our wonderful meal, we each chose the panna cotta with a marmelade de pêches et d'abricots. This was a sensational ending to a perfect meal.

Many of the restaurant's offerings reflect the Basque roots of the chef. Charcuterie is well-represented as are regional aperitifs and wines and the delicious gateau Basque. What seems to be missing are the Basque peppers which you will find on every menu in the south.

We happily munched on our bit of Basque cake as we enjoyed our coffee at the end of the meal.

Once again, the Guide Michelin came through.

La cuisine est mon violon d'Ingres

A visit to a Parisian classic, Le Violon d'Ingres, that has evolved over the years and proves itself again and again.

The story has it that the painter, Ingres was enthralled with the violin. So when French people talk about their hobby or passion, they say that it is their violin d'Ingres. Such a lovely way to characterize a rather mondaine concept. My passion is definitely cooking, food and restaurants and the chef, Christian Constant was thinking the same thing when he opened his restaurant, Le Violon d'Ingres on the rue St. Dominique.

I decided to take two friends who had just arrived from Japan to lunch at this lovely restaurant. Their luggage in the cloak room, we sat and ate and talked. Le Violon offers a 30-euro 3-course lunch during the week but if you don't like the choices, you will find many on the à la carte menu.

After our celebratory Taittinger coupes de champagne, we studied the menu and decided to go for the à la carte main course offerings and dessert if we had room.

Toshio chose the grilled Acquitaine beef that was garnished with a wonderful macaroni and cheese (gratin de macaronis). Yuko chose the grilled selle d'agneau with provençale vegetables and I had a wonderful open raviolo that was filled with Breton lobster, girolles and fevettes (chanterelles and fresh lima beans). Every dish was a winner.

With my dish, I wisely chose a glass of Chablis, but as my friends were completely jet-lagged, they decided to stick with their glass of champagne.

Desserts were wonderful but after a copious main course, we chose from the more light offerings. I had a pêche melba of pêches de vigne (do we have them in the US?) They are purpley-red peaches. This melba was served with a lovely violet ice cream. Toshio had some home made raspberry sorbet.

The service in this fine restaurant was excellent and our server was very helpful with my friends' luggage as well as making sure that they got into their taxi headed for their next next stop (La Gare du Nord for the train to Brussels).

Constant is an historic contemporary chef. Those he has trained have gone off to start a young chef revolution in Paris and he himself has two one-star restaurants and two excellent bistrots on the rue St. Dominique.
He has devoted his life to changing the face of French cuisine into a continually evolving phenomenon with an attention to fresh ingredients and low-cost preparations.

Something's Gotta Give

Lunch with a friend at a wonderful brasserie in the center of Paris

Do you remember the film with Diane Keaton and Jack Nicholson: Something's Gotta Give? Diane raved about the restaurant, Le Grand Colbert, and after that it became a destination for America tourists. But it is French through and through.

As it was August, and very few good restaurants are open during that month, I thought it would be fun for me to go there with my friend, Noriko.

The restaurant is very proud of its notoriety since the film was released and they even show the entire film in the back hall. There is a review of the film at the entrance.

This is a beautiful authentic French brasserie with classically prepared dishes such as grilled salmon with tagliatelles, lamb chops with gratin dauphinois, grilled rognons with a sauce béarnaise. Light eaters can choose one of the copious salads.

Noriko had the Salade Le Grand Colbert with hard boiled eggs, anchovies, sun-dried tomatoes and thinly sliced parmesan. I had the avocado salad with shrimp and grapefruit. Both were excellent. Since we had room for dessert, I chose the baba au rhum with chantilly with its tiny pitcher of sweet rum syrup, and Noriko had a beautiful raspberry and blackberry tart. I think that this is a place to bring friends from other countries who want to take part in a truly French experience. The service is attentive and friendly and the price is right. The restaurant is truly a classic.

Marseille: Gastronomic Dining

Dining in three hallowed restaurants in Marseille with excellent experiences all around.

Three days in Marseille--what a pleasure. The most important dish to get is bouillabaisse and I chose the best of the best: Chez Michel des Calanques. (Les Calanques is one of the many neighborhoods of the city.) Although there is no outdoor dining, the room is airy and the view is of the sea. Michel agreed to prepare a bouillabaisse for one and I was completely thrilled with his rendition. The broth--redolent with tomato, orange and saffron was spectacular. This was not a fancy Parisien bouillabaisse with langoustines and gambas. Rather, Michel prepares a traditional bouillabaisse and the evening I was there, he used St. Pierre and Vive. With potatoes and home-made croutons spread with aioli, it made for a satisfying and filling repast: two servings of bouillon into which one can't help dipping the fish and potatoes which are served on a separate plate. I slurped and swallowed and was in 7th heaven. This was the best meal I had in the seaside town of Marseille.

The next day, I had a reservation at Le Petit Nice. Gerald Passedat obtained his third Michelin star here in 2008 and this was the reason for my trip. I reserved for lunch, and had my champagne aperitif with amuse-bouches on the terrace with a stunning view of the sea. Moving inside the restaurant for the serious dining, I was also privy to a spectacular view.

I chose the Menu Evolution, billed as light and featuring the best fish and seafood imaginable. For starters was the Sea Anemone in three different preparations: in a foam with caviar of Aquitaine, in a fritter simply fried and delicate, in its shell with a parsley coulis, a mussel and some clams. This was a lovely starter. Next was a wonderful line-caught bass with a lemon sauce, eggplant, fennel and a rice cake. This dish was also very light and flavorful. Passedat serves a raw fish dish in this menu--flavored with bergamote (citrus oil) and a yuzu vinaigrette and garnished with zucchini in tempura: very Asian and very delicious. This dish was garnished with a julienne of baby vegetables that were marinated in a lovely fresh tomato sauce.

La pièce de resistance was the lobster. It was prepared with vegetables and a mango salad alongside a granny smith purée. It was called Homard dans un Jus Mauve and that is the color of the light jus that embellished the preparation.

The desserts were very light: strawberries with a frozen cheese from Corsica, garnished with fraises des bois. This dish was pretty but disappointing--it had no soul.

I chose wines from the region for the meal and treated myself to a fancy glass of Puligny Montrachet Emile Sauzet 2005 to have with the lobster.

My first criticism of this meal was that it was ultra-light. Although I don't want to leave the dinner table feeling totally stuffed, I do want to experience the pleasure of the meal for several hours afterwards. In the case of Passedat, the meal was so light that I was ready to eat a pizza dinner a few hours later.

Most of all, when I go to a three star restaurant, I expect to have a truly spectacular meal. This was a good meal but nothing more than that. It didn't sparkle and shine for me. Nor did it make me want to return to try more of the chef's creations.

For my last evening in Marseille, I chose a 1-star restaurant down the street from Passedat's place: L'Epuisette. The menu looked extremely promising. I arrived at sunset and saw a stunning one from my seaside table. The apéritif was my favorite champagne: Billecart Salmon Rosé. This came with a lovely assortment of appetizers including a puff pastry of cod, a tempura of St. Pierre and a lovely fresh pea soup.

The real amuse-bouche (to put you in the mood for the meal) was a luscious crème brulée de foie gras. Although smooth and sensual, it was much too salty.

For my appetizer, I had a very inventive and beautiful saute of jumbo shrimp on a provençale pizza with tomatoes, zucchini and olives, and garnished with a purée of avocado. All of this was topped with a perfectly poached egg.

Rouget is the thing to get in Provence, so I steered away from my favorite turbot in favor of the rouget dish. The tiny fish were garnished with a flavorful mushroom risotto, slivers of parmesan and a reduction of morel mushrooms. The risotto was full of succulent cèpes. This was a spectacular dish.

Unfortunately, the maître d'hotel misunderstood my dessert order and the kitchen sent out something I didn't want. By that time in the evening, there was no more of the wonderful chocolate dessert I craved. As a result, I chose the sablé Breton with berries and a bit of chocolate garnished with berry sorbet. It was light and lovely but not what I had wanted. If this had happened in the states, the dessert would have been offered but here in France, the best I could do was with an "I am sorry" on the part of the maître d'hotel.

Despite that little disappointment, I had a very nice meal at this restaurant.

In fact, I liked every restaurant I went to in Marseille. It is a truly foodie town for fish lovers like me.

Searching for Pizza in Marseille

A fruitful search for pizza including an expensive taxi ride and the names of the best pizzerias in Marseille.

I had heard that Marseille pizza is on the top ten list of the greats so of course, I had to venture out to the best place. Everyone talked about Chez Vincent so I asked my taxi driver to take me there. It was quite a long ride from my hotel, and on the way, I discovered that we were talking about two different Chez Vincents. However, both his (the best in the city, he said) and mine (number one on the list in my guide book) were closed for the summer vacation. From there, I chose Chez Etienne, not far from the second Chez Vincent and in what is called the Five Avenues neighborhood. No luck there so we proceeded to Chez Sauveur.

On the way, I had a tour of many of the neighborhoods in Marseille. Although the city is organized into "arrondissements" or districts, the Marseillais refer to the different neighborhoods by name--such as Le Panier, Les Cinq Avenues, Le Vieux Port, Les Calanques, etc. I must say that the city itself is not very attractive but the views are spectacular.

We went to two more pizzerias (closed) and then close to the next one our combined lists, we ran into a big traffic jam. I was watching the counter mount up, so I told the driver I was ready to walk. He directed me to Chez Noel. After about 15 minutes, I began to lose hope, but when I turned a corner, there it was: open!!!!! The taxi ride had cost me 40 euros (about $55) for a very inexpensive meal.

Ordering the pizza was interesting. They had a menu of set ones and I chose the anchovy pizza--remaining true to the region. However, I had to order the mozzarella as well! The basic pizza comes with dough and tomato sauce and that's it. The pizza was as good as the best pizza I could get in Paris--that is not very terrific at all. The bill came to about 15 euros for pizza, wine and coffee. I thought of the experience as a private tour of the city ending with a pizza dinner.